You may have heard that there was a couple of big earthquakes off the coast of British Columbia, and that there was a major evacuation in Hawaii for a possible tsunami. We got the word out here too, so it was an evening of moving heavy equipment to high ground and waiting on the 3rd floor of Charlie Barracks. We had the news playing on TV, and were watching our tide gauge data online. We don't have direct access, so we just had to watch it on the NOAA website. We got the all clear about 12:30 pm and all got to go home. As you can see by the screen capture below, we really didn't get much. I checked a few of the beaches today, and there was no sign of anything out of the ordinary, which was alright with me.
Here is the data from the tide station, taken from NOAA's web page:
You can see the variation after 08:00 on the chart. You can click on it and make it bigger.
The island population waited in the hallway and rooms of Charlie Barracks. The emergency lights were only on shortly while the generators were swapped. We had power for most of the wait.
This is the NOAA tide station out at the end of the harbor. It's just the 2 white tubes and the little shed.
I forgot to mention last week that the Black-footed albatrosses started coming back. There aren't too many of them around yet, but there will be soon. The Laysan albatross have not returned yet.
No special story with this photo, I just liked the bird in the Sweet Alyssum.
Here's a screen capture from Google Maps. As I mentioned last week, you can go in the garage at the office. You can also go into the Transportation building. It's cool to play around with if you have the bandwidth, which I really don't. You can make this photo a bit bigger by clicking on it, or just look at Google Maps.
To all friends, family, aquaintences, and anyone just interested in Midway, we're all fine here. Our tide gage only showed a rise of inches. We'll check in the morning to make sure nothing actually happened. We just had a nice wait up on the 3rd floor of Charlie Barracks. I'll do a real blog post later, because it's 1 am here and the internet is really slow with everyone trying to contact their families.
Sorry I'm a day late, but I really didn't have a whole lot to tell you about. I've just been busy working and not taking many photos.
Last night I heard that "Street View" is now available on Google Maps for Midway. It doesn't look like they have Eastern or Spit Islands on yet, but you can even go into the garage at the office. I searched for "Midway Atoll" and "Midway Islands" and it got to the right place, but "Midway Island" brought me to Virginia. So for the comment last week about more photos of buildings and housing, you can now take a virtual tour of Midway.
Nine Greater white-fronted geese flew in this week (only 4 in this photo so don't take too much time trying to count all 9). They are all juveniles. The last one we had was in 2007 on Eastern Island, which you can see a photo of if you go back to Dec. of 2007 on my blog.
The Brown noddies don't like the geese and swarm around them when they fly.
Here's a view of Sand Island from Eastern Island. I don't have a lot of photos this time, so you can have some time to poke around on Google Maps.
By Robbie Graham Silver Screen Saucers Disney's aborted 1950s UFO acclimation movie headed for the big screen?
Earlier this year, Silver Screen Saucers asked: “Could it be that Disney is producing a dramatization of the flying saucer fever that swept America in 1952?” That question was prompted by the enigmatic title 1952 – a “top secret” Disney production quietly announced by the House of Mouse back in June of 2011. We were told that a script was being penned by Damon Lindelof (Prometheus, Cowboys and Aliens), and nothing more. We subsequently learned that Brad Bird (TheIron Giant, The Incredibles) had signed on to co-write and direct.
But yesterday (Oct. 17) saw some intriguing (and confusing) developments when Vulture reported the following:
Despite its title, 1952 is largely set in the present day.
Its plot will focus on aliens visiting Earth for the first time.
The film will also reportedly follow a man in his late 40s through this alien ordeal.
Lindelof and Bird are aiming to re-create the magic of Close Encounters of the Third Kind.
1952 co-writer Damon Lindelof
Vulture also reported on the movie’s mysterious back-story, which goes like this: last spring,Disney’s head of production, Sean Bailey, arranged for screenwriter Lindelof to be given access to “one of the studio’s odder curiosities: a banker’s box of files and documents that had been left moldering in Walt Disney’s personal development lab, WED Enterprises, which later became the studio’s vaunted Imagineering department.”
According to Vulture’s “spies”, the box was originally labelled with the title of Disney’s 1965 comedy That Darn Cat!, which had been crossed out and in its place was written “1952.” Apparently, inside the box was a “collection of documents and primary source materials that, when looked at all together, indicated that someone had been working on a project (movie? Theme park ride?) about alien contact."
The identity of this “someone” from Disney’s bygone era working on a project about alien contact has not been specified. As it turns out, though, we may already know... the name “Ward Kimball” springs to mind.
While at a MUFON symposium in 1979, Oscar-winning Disney animator and Imagineer Ward Kimball (the man behind Jiminy Cricket, The Mad Hatter and Pinocchio) claimed that the United States Air Force (USAF) had approached Walt Disney himself during the 1950s to request his cooperation on a documentary about UFOs that would help acclimate the American public to the reality of extraterrestrials. According to Kimball, in exchange for Disney’s cooperation, the USAF offered to furnish the production with genuine UFO footage. Kimball claimed that Disney accepted the deal and – ever faithful to Uncle Sam – began work immediately on the USAF project. It wasn’t long, however, before the USAF reneged on its offer of UFO footage. When Kimball challenged the USAF Colonel overseeing the project he was told that "there was indeed plenty of UFO footage, but that neither Kimball, nor anyone else was going to get access to it." The project was then abandoned and eventually forgotten by all but the few who had worked on it.
Walt Disney's most trusted animators - his "nine old men" - included Ward Kimball (pictured far left, front).
So, could Disney’s mysterious 1952 be a 21 Century revival of its aborted 1950s UFO acclimation project? Based on the information thus far presented, there would certainly appear to be a connection... but hold on there, because here’s where it gets confusing...
Within hours of publishing his inside scoop on 1952, Vulture’s Claude Brodesser-Akner posted the following correction to his report:
“Apparently I misunderstood my source for this story, who contacted me after it was posted to clarify that while it is true that 1952 is very much in the spirit of Close Encounters (and centers around a Roy Neary-like protagonist), it is not in fact about an alien encounter. My apologies for the erroneous plot description.”
Roy Neary (Richard Dreyfuss) making first contact in Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)
Hmmm. So when the unnamed source told Vulture: “It will be set largely in the present day and it is about aliens making contact here on Earth,” and that the aborted Disney project that inspired it was “about alien contact,” apparently this was just a miscommunication. And yet it is just like Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Hmmm. Could it be that Vulture’s source (almost certainly an official viral ‘leaker’ for Disney) spilled one too many beans in his revelation of the movie’s alien aspect, has been reprimanded by the studio and has subsequently issued a rather implausible “correction”?
It’s hard to say for sure, but given the past UFO-themed credits of screenwriter Damon Lindelof, and in light of Disney’s longstanding fascination with the UFO enigma– not to mention the strong UFO-related connotations of the 1952title – my money is still firmly on this movie being about aliens.
In terms of the movie’s marketing, Vulture also reported the following:
“The collaborators are planning an elaborate, very J.J. Abrams–like advanced marketing campaign that will start before filming even begins. The idea is to stage a treasure hunt for intrigued moviegoers that will gradually reveal clues about and build intrigue for the film right up until its release, and which may or may not be related to the contents of the box.”
Perhaps, then, the “box” is just a viral marketing device vaguely inspired by Kimball’s story? Or perhaps it is, as the source originally stated, a real box with real photos and documentation that have directly inspired a new and highly secretive Disney project? Perhaps the box is a remnant of the aborted Disney UFO documentary?
Indulging the latter assumption for a moment – that this new movie will feature real photos and/or footage of UFOs and perhaps even their occupants – what would be the point? If presented in a fictional context (as apparently it would be), said material would immediately be fictionalized by way of its presentation in a “science-fiction” movie. Also, in today’s world of photorealistic CGI and Performance Capture technologies, debates surrounding “real” and “faked” footage would be very difficult to resolve. We could be looking at genuine alien landing footage from any time during the modern UFO era and automatically assume it to be CGI.
So again I’ll say, “hmmm.” Intriguing stuff, for sure, but until Disney hits us with more info on 1952, I’ll quit with the speculation. Watch this space...
The Kahana was back through this week dropping off supplies and bringing people to Kure, Laysan, and French Frigate Shoals. They had some big waves at Laysan so couldn't actually drop anyone or anything off, so they'll have to swap crews and get supplies onto the island on the way back down the chain. All of these island crews will be on their respective islands until March or so.
The Kahana is parked at the tug pier at Midway.
Here's the crew going out to Kure. The returning people will be here until Thursday, when they'll fly out. Except the guy in the maroon shirt. That's Jim and he's Kahana crew.
This has been the view out my back window since I moved in.
The contractors took out that shed that was pretty useless anyway.
I like my view much better now.
My little Olympus camera has some interesting effects settings. This is the sun going down behind some ironwood trees with invasive bush beardgrass in the foreground. Most of my different than usual photos lately have been with this camera.
In a new interview with the UK comedy website Chortle, Irish comedian Andrew Maxwell has described his ordeal of being detained at gunpoint at Area 51, the super-secret US military facility in Nevada believed by some to house extraterrestrial technologies. The events unfolded while Maxwell was filming a UFO-themed episode of the BBC documentary series Conspiracy Road Trip earlier this year.
Maxwell told Chortle:
“We got to the [Area 51] barrier and I’m expecting some soldiers to come out and tell us to “piss off”. We’ll have that on camera, job done, that’s enough for British TV.”
“Then, one of our group knocks on the guard hut door and all hell breaks loose, four soldiers rush out with M16s. ‘On the fucking floor! On the floor right now!’ We spent three, maybe four hours like that. Passports taken, all the footage and equipment.”
According to the BBC, Conspiracy Road Trip is “an effort to tackle the truth” about conspiracy theories, with individual episodes examining various conspiratorial subjects, including state-sponsored terrorism and, in this case, UFOs. However, Maxwell’s statements to Chortle indicate that the BBC series is less concerned with “tackling” uncomfortable truths than with debunking them. In his interview, Maxwell makes no secret of the fact that this particular episode was rigged from the outset to ridicule the UFO subject – a fact that apparently saved him and his group from being incarcerated:
“Luckily, when the sheriffs turned up this deputy had a sense of humour. It had been rung through to him that I was an Irish comedian leading these UFO nutjobs, that I didn’t believe any of it and was there to debunk it for the BBC.”
Conspiracy Road Trip: UFOswill be broadcast Monday October 15 at 9PM on BBC 3.
Foreshadowing, Unexplainable Pregnancies, Hybrid Children and the Creative Process
By Mike Clelland
Hand-lettered TIMELINE of critical events within the essay.
Something extremely strange is interwoven into the UFO phenomenon. There are weird coincidences and synchronicities that seem to merge with the overall topic in ways that defy any easy explanation. This includes a kind of predictive manifestation in our pop culture. If you dig just a little bit you’ll find that movies, radio drama, literature and (especially) comic books all have a way of anticipating the plot points of the unfolding UFO drama.
Anyone of a certain generation will remember the ABC Movie of the Week. It featured hour-and-a-half-long made for TV movies each Tuesday night. I clearly remember one of these movies. It was about a women who is mysteriously pregnant with an alien child. I am 50 years old as I write this and I would have been 12 years old on that long ago Tuesday night in 1974. For reasons I don’t quite understand, bits of that movie have been stuck in my head for the last 38 years.
I’ve been actively studying the UFO abduction phenomenon and I recently reviewed a series of questionnaires that abduction researchers will use with their clients. One of the consistent questions is: “Do you crave salt?”
When I read that I immediately went back to that TV movie, and I clearly remembered a scene where a pregnant woman would compulsively put salt on her salad at an outdoor restaurant. It didn’t take but a few mouse clicks to get me to YouTube where I watched that very scene. Surprisingly, the scene played out exactly as I remembered it. This clip is embedded below...
The fact that my memory was so eerily precise after all those years piqued my interest, so I ordered a used DVD copy of the movie, and in less than a week I was watching it again.
The movie is titled The Stranger Within, and watching it opened up a deep dark hole of synchro-weirdness.
Before we examine the movie, it’s important to explain what has emerged in recent years concerning the strange experiences of women abductees.
Women, pregnancy and UFOs
Women claiming the UFO abduction experience are telling stories that are frighteningly similar. What is being told stretches my fragile mind.
These abductions appear to be ongoing starting when they are very young. Upon puberty a nightmare set of procedures begin to unfold. These young women are somehow impregnated during their abduction events, it might be done by technological means or it might be done with someone (or something) onboard a craft. Like almost all abduction events, they are subjected to some form of mind control that makes them follow commands and erases their memories.
These women will tell of having the all symptoms of pregnancy, often it will happen without any history of being sexually active. Later, usually within the first trimester, the women will awake one morning with the very real knowing that they are no longer pregnant. They might have memories of an abduction during the night where the fetus is removed.
Both men and women abductees tell of rooms onboard ships that are lined with some sort of liquid filled glass aquariums, each with a fetus floating inside. These incubation chambers are reported with consistency. Sometime later these women will be abducted again, and presented with a tiny baby, and they’ll be told that they are the mother. The infant isn’t normal, it appears sickly and thin, it seems to be a hybrid of us and them.
These women will experience ongoing abduction events where, over the years, they will see their children growing up. They will appear in nurseries and classrooms and they will be growing up at an accelerated rate that wouldn’t match their life on earth. Eventually, these women may meet their children as young adults, sometimes this happens here on earth while they are awake and fully consciousness.
There are plenty of reports in the literature of children born to abductee mothers with curious traits and abilities, including psychic skills, profound empathy or a very high IQ.Often the mother will remember being abducted during the child’s pregnancy. Indigo children, Star Seeds, Light Workers and Crystal Children are all terms used to describe these kids.
This short summary of experiences doesn’t emerge in any kind of linear construct, it is usually a mess of fears, impressions, dreams and mixed-up snippets of memory.
I am cautious to give a percentage, but anecdotally it is nearly consistent that pretty much ALL women who claim the abduction phenomenon will have experiences that involve cryptic pregnancies.
I need to emphasize that these experiences are happening to real women, and they are profoundly challenging and emotional. When someone shares their life events with me, and when they tell about their unaccountable pregnancies, they will almost always end up sobbing.
Reported experiences by abductees
There is a long list of odd coincidences that show up in The Stranger Within that seem to have accurately predicted what is now common in the UFO abduction lore. These are listed as in bulleted points below:
~ Amnesia of the abduction experience, later retrieved through hypnosis.
~ Driving to a secluded spot for unknown reasons.
~ Wounds healing rapidly.
~ Marks on the body that can’t be explained, only to heal rapidly without scaring.
~ Rh negative blood type.
~ Being mysteriously cured of an unknown ailment.
~ Lower than normal body temperature.
~ The urge to research and study scientific topics.
~ Sensitivity to sound.
~ Excessive craving for salt.
In addition, some researchers have noted that an overwhelming percentage of abductees are creative types. In the movie Ann is a painter.
In the movie, the fetus was growing much faster than a normal child, the gestation was accelerated, and the birth was due months early. This also shows up in the abduction literature.
Abduction questionnaires
UFO abduction researchers will have a set of questions they’ll ask their clients. You can infer a lot from these questions. Many of these questionnaires are posted on-line, and I’ve collected some relevant questions that play out in the movie, these are listed below:
~ Do you have an unusual fear of doctors or medical treatment?
~ Have you ever experienced a dramatic healing?
~ Do you feel that aliens have come to create mutants through a process of interbreeding accomplished by their superior science?
~ Do you have an obsessive memory that will not go away, such as seeing an alien face or a strange baby, or an examination table or needles, etc.?
~ For women only: Have you had frequent female problems and reproductive difficulties?
~ If you are a female, have you experienced a gynaecological problem that you suspect is related to an abduction experience?
~ Men and Women: Have you had frequent urinary tract infections?
~ Have you had any disturbing or realistic dreams about babies or small children?
~ If you are a woman, have you ever felt certain that you were pregnant, but the pregnancy suddenly disappeared?
~ Have you ever had a false pregnancy or missing fetus?
~ Have awakened with soreness in your genitals which could not be explained?
~ Do you crave salt?
Plot summery for The Stranger Within(mucho spoilers)
Barbra Eden, the curvy starlet from I Dream of Jeanne, plays the dramatic role of Ann Collins, the wife of a college professor who is mysteriously pregnant. Her husband has had a vasectomy in response to Ann’s life threatening experience with a pregnancy three years earlier. The details of that event are only hinted at in the script. The husband’s vasectomy is pretty bold stuff for a made for TV script from the early 70’s, and it allows for a lot of marital tension and open dialog about infidelity and abortions.
As the movie progresses Ann’s behavior becomes increasingly strange. The husband, together with Ann’s doctor and a close friend, eventually come to the conclusion that she was impregnated by space aliens during an abduction event where her memory was erased. The narrative unfolds with absolute seriousness, this in an era where anything involving UFOs was played for giggles.
Please don’t think this movie is some lost masterpiece of the cinema, it certainly isn’t. It’s a modest little movie made with a sparse little cast on a low budget. The early 70’s is an easily dismissed chapter of television filmmaking, there are a lot of elements that seem tacky and laughable by today’s excessively slick standards. But for me, there is something truly haunting about this movie.
The director of The Stranger Within was Lee Philips(1927–1999). He was a busy guy during his years as a director for TV. Philips was also an actor and he played the role of radio DJ Gene 'Buddy' Maxwell in the very first Outer Limits episode, Galaxy Being.
"Yes Master!"
Barbara Eden will forever be remembered as the girl in the bottle from I Dream of Jeanne, a lighthearted depiction of The Djinn (the source of the term Genie). Rosemary Ellen Guiley is a paranormal researcher and in her 2011 book The Vengeful Djinn(written with Phil Imbrogno) she explores how the Djinn mythology closely parallels the modern UFO abduction phenomenon. Seems the Djinn show a keen interest in pregnant women and are known to abduct babies.
I Dream of Jeanne also featured one of the key ingredients to any good UFO conspiracy, astronauts keeping esoteric secrets! I’ll add that in this sit-com Barbara Eden was the source of some seriously weird sexual tension, much like her role in The Stranger Within.
Ms. Eden has always had a rather strange halting voice, and this serves her well in this eerie movie as well as in her role as Jeanne. Curiously, the name Eden seems appropriate for a woman who is bringing the first alien hybrid child into our world.
Barbara Eden has recently penned a 288 page autobiography where she writes exactly two sentences on this film:
In 1974 I appeared in a real howler of a TV movie of the week, The Stranger Within, in which I gave birth to an alien baby, ate raw meat, and drank a lot of coffee. Sigmond Freud probably would have had a field day analyzing that script!
Alas, I’m no Freud, but I am having a field day.
There is a long list of plot points within this made for TV drama that are extremely predictive in a way that stretches my mind.
As noted above, present day UFO lore is flooded with stories from women abductees who tell of mysterious pregnancies, erased memories and hybrid children with miraculous abilities. These issues are at the core of this fictional narrative. That said, there doesn’t seem to be any logical inspiration for the original story.
The movie was aired on October 1st 1974, but it was based on a short story from 1953. This story was written over 30 years before any of these bizarre claims about hybrid offspring had entered the collective consciousness.
I believe it was Budd Hopkins’ 1987 book Intruders where the initial accounts of strange pregnancies and hybrid fetuses first appeared in print. Initially, this pattern was called: “the tiny baby syndrome.”
This was followed by Raymond Fowler’s 1991 book The Watchers. Next was Abducted!(1994) written by Debbie Jordan and her sister Kathy Mitchell. This is a first-person account from the two main characters from Hopkins book. In 1995 Kim Carlsberg published her first-person account of the same phenomenon in her book Beyond My Wildest Dreams.
Pregnancy and UFO abduction are part of the 1957 Antonio Villas-Boas case in Brazil. The 23 year Boas was taken onto a craft, and after a series of examinations he was left alone in a room with a humanoid woman. He said he was strongly attracted to the woman, and the two had sex. When it was over the female smiled, rubbed her belly and pointed at the sky. Boas took this to mean she was now pregnant and was going to raise their hybrid child in space.
When the Boas story was initially published the sex and pregnancy stuff wasn’t included in any of the public reports, it was deemed to bizarre to be taken seriously.
The original short story
The 1974 movie The Stranger Within was based on a 1953 short story by Richard Matheson (left) titled Mother by Protest (later re-published as Trespass). Matheson himself adapted it for the small screen.
Matheson was born in 1926 (the same year as my father, something that makes me pay closer attention) and his creative output has been impressive. He has penned a massive amount of fantasy, horror, and science fiction.
It would be easy to conclude that Matheson was somehow inspired by details from UFO reports and he simply wrote his short story as a response to their appearance in pop-culture at the time. But that just doesn’t fit, 1953 was a long time before any of this information emerged.
Reading this tightly knit little drama left me impressed. The short story is essentially the same as the movie, including some word-for-word dialog.
In both versions the wife begs for the husband to believe her, and she says she wants to be hypnotized as a way to prove her honesty. In the short story the husband’s closest friend states: “...do what she suggests and try hypnosis, truth serum, anything.” They follow up by injecting a “truth” serum on the wife and the results read like a hypnosis transcript.
Near the end of the short story, as the wife is going into labor, she slips in and out of consciousness and she tells the husband her memories of the event while he was away.
“In the yard, David,” she muttered, still unconscious... “I heard a sound and I went out. The stars were bright and there was a crescent moon. While I stood there I saw a white light come over the yard. I started to run back to the house but something hit me but then it was black and I couldn’t remember. Anything. I tried to tell you but I couldn’t remember, I couldn’t remember, I couldn’t...”
The use of the term crescent in her description made me take notice. David Huggins is a UFO abductee and artist. His experiences involve a lot of weird sex and hybrid children. He tells of having a life-long loving relationship with a chalky white alien named Crescent, in reference to the crescent moon. His story is chronicled in words and pictures in the 2009 book Love in an Alien Purgatory.
A painting by David Huggins, one of hundreds that depict his relationship
with an alien named Crescent, seen holding the hybrid baby.
In the movie there is a slightly different account of Ann’s abduction. It happens during a hypnosis session performed by her husband’s friend. She tells of being hit with a ray while she was painting in the hills. She says it came from a space ship above her.
Both versions of Ann’s contact experience describe the now prototypical UFO abduction event, complete with the mind-controlled amnesia and some sort of beam of light.
In both the book and movie, it’s the husband’s friend who solves the mystery by piecing together the clues. In the 1953 book the conclusion was that the baby is a Martian. That quaint presumption certainly matches the mindset of the era. Also in the book, the friend concludes that the Martian hybrid fetus is telepathic. Now this really surprised me because telepathy is a nearly universal component to all UFO abduction narratives, and I feel strongly that this would have been entirely unknown at the time. In the 1974 movie the term Martian isn’t used, it’s replaced by extraterrestrial.
I read a handful of on-line reviews of the 1974 movie and several noted that it was merely a knock-off of Rosemary’s Baby with an alien twist. That doesn’t fit when you realize that the original short story was first published in 1953, pre-dating Ira Levin’s 1967 book by 14 years. The more logical conclusion would be that Levin was inspired by Matheson.
Rh negative blood
The issue surrounding Rh negative blood type is something that has only recently emerged within the community of UFO abduction researchers. Blood types are either negative or positive, and it’s estimated that only 15% of the entire world's population are known to have the Rh negative blood factor, with some estimates are as low as 5%. But research(albeit limited) shows that well over 50% of the people that claim the UFO abduction experience have Rh negative blood. This is a weird statistic, and it implies that the abductors have very specific interests in the people they abduct. Also, Rh negative blood is often associated with clairvoyance and psychic skills
In the movie, the doctor is perplexed and says that Ann’s blood was changing to Rh Positive. This means that her blood was Rh negative at the time of her abduction. This is a curious issue to show up in a script from over 38 years ago, especially given its relevance to present day UFO abduction research.
Hypnosis and UFO abduction
Raspy voiced David Doyle.
The best friend to the husband is a hypnotist, he is portrayed by none other than Bosley from Charlie's Angels, that right, David Doyle! Each of the sessions are dark and moody, played for maximum drama.
Hypnosis as a tool in UFO abduction research made its debut in the public consciousness in 1966 with John G. Fuller’s seminal book The Interrupted Journey. This is the story of the Betty and Barney Hill UFO abduction event, and it’s considered to be the first published account of the phenomena. In the book, Betty tells of having a long needle inserted into her navel and she is told that it’s a pregnancy test. So, even in the very first report of alien abduction, pregnancy is part of the meme.
So, the use of hypnosis had been established eight years before the creation of this movie. The two main male characters debate the outcome of the hypnosis session, and Ann’s husband accuses his friend of “leading” his wife while she was under his spell. Here, in 1974 in a brief bit of dialog, we get a tidy summarization of the heated controversy over the use of hypnosis in abduction research.
In the short story a serum is used to induce the hypnotic effect. Though never stated in the text, this was probably Sodium Pentothal, also known as The Truth Serum. Sodium Pentothal also shows up in the modern abduction lore in a book titled Pozan (2003) by John Clark. This is a first-person non-fiction narrative about UFO abductions and profound synchronicities. In this book the author tells of receiving Sodium Pentothal during a minor surgery, and while under he said some things that terrified the Doctor. He was never able to get the Doctor to tell him what he said, but the implications are creepy indeed.
Channeling and longing
One of the hot-button subjects among abduction researchers is channeling. I am consistently shocked at how many abductees will say that since having their contact experiences they have begun to channel information from their alien abductors. These claims get dismissed with venomous contempt by a lot of researchers, but it is an unmistakable pattern among the experiencers.
In both the short story and the movie, Ann channels a strange alien language. She also speaks (in English) in the first-person as if she is an alien, she describes a deep longing for their home planet and its orange oceans and cool gray winds.
In the short story Ann says: “Now am I alien and forgotten, O lost of travelled night.” This happened while she was sleeping, and the terrified husband heard it. The text reads: “All spoken in a sing-song rhythm, in a voice that was Ann’s and not Ann’s,” a pretty accurate description of someone channeling.
Abduction researcher and therapist Delores Cannon uses hypnosis in her past life regression therapy. She has been able to bring forth alien personas while her patients are in a deep state of relaxation. What emerges is a back and forth alien dialog and it’s the basis for a long list of her books. What we see in the movie closely parallels her research techniques.
While in a trance, Ann repeats: “Take me back, take me back!”
This feeling of longing to go home is commonly reported by UFO abductees. They will sometimes state that that their soul is not of this earth but from some far off planet.
In both the short story and the movie, while speaking in the halting alien voice, Ann says she feels heavy. Some abductees will say that life on this earth has an oppressive heaviness, the implication being that they are remembering a past life lived not as a material being but as some sort of ethereal spirit, or in some other realm with different gravity.
The Sun Goddess
There is never any UFO shown during the movie, but there is reoccurring imagery of the sun, and it is constantly shown in the context of a deep longing. Ann will be lost in haunted contemplation and the camera will pan up to the sun and the image will linger there awash in lens flare (this is a staple of 1970’s movie making). The sun is a stand in for the UFO, and there is an overt sense of yearning each time it fills the screen.
Our pregnant mother resonates a Sun Goddess. The earliest deities associated with the sun are all goddesses, much like our abductee Ann. In ancient Egyptian imagery the Goddess Isis is portrayed with a cow horn headdress cradling a solar disk. Some esoteric interpretations of that solar disk cast it as a flying saucer, implying that ancient aliens were the actual Egyptian Gods. Isis was worshipped as the ideal mother and she is often portrayed nursing her infant son, Horus God of the Sun (as pictured left). Some scholars point out that the mythology of Horus has compelling parallels to the story of Jesus. This would put Ann in the role of Mary (more on that later)
There was a live-action Saturday morning series called The Secrets of Isis where a mild mannered woman would change into the Goddess Isis, given the absurdly low budget of the show the transformation was implied by using a close up of the sun complete with shimmering lens flare. Isis had super hero powers to fight crimes and right wrongs. This rather terrible show ran for two seasons, 1975 and ’76.
In the movie, Ann drives a bright yellow Chevy Nova, as did my mother around that same time period. The Latin translation of Nova is “new” or “strange” and it’s a feminine word. The Latin word for star is Stella, also feminine; and some translations for nova say it is a shortening of nova stella (new star).
1974: lame TV / Boss cars.
In astronomy, Nova is a star that suddenly increases its brightness, and then fades away. This certainly matches Ann’s behavior in the movie, during her pregnancy she becomes tremendously bright by obsessively reading textbooks. After the child's birth she simply fades away, this happens in a lap-dissolve where she quite literally fades away to nothingness.
The color Yellow, the color of her NOVA, represents the third Chakra, the Solar Plexus.
In its Hebrew origin, the name Ann means "He has favored me" and “He” implies God himself. In the story, Ann has certainly been favored by the mysterious alien Gods.
Rituals, mythology and religion
In the movie Ann and her husband live in a gaudy house with a strange square fireplace, it sits in the center of the living room under a large vent. It must have been quite hip in its day. This fireplace has the weird feeling of being a sacrificial alter, adding to the overall strangeness of the story. Also, when Ann undergoes her first hypnotic regression the room is filled with candles creating an oppressive occult mood. The act of hypnosis is played out as some sort of eerie ritual. After the hypnosis session when Ann channels the alien voice, the witnesses try to come to terms with what they’ve seen, and the camera is positioned behind the open fireplace, with flames rising up in the foreground.
Barbara Eden as Goddess with divine child.
The movie reaches its climax as Ann walks in a trance with her newborn child along a path through a forest, she is obviously mind controlled by her alien abductors. She is soon joined by other women carrying babies. These women are all wearing robes or flowing garments and their hair has been done up to mimic Greek Goddesses. The overall effect is of some sort of ancient ritual or occult offering. They all march willingly into the sun.
Our collective society is overtly influenced by organized Christianity, so much so that the starting point of our calendar is synchronized to the birth of Christ. Within this framework nothing is more revered that The Blessed Virgin.
Alien visitation?
In The Book of Luke, Archangel Gabriel visits Mary and tells her, “Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favor with God. You will conceive and give birth to a son...” and she is told that the child is destined for greatness. “How will this be,” Mary asked the angel, “since I am a virgin?” A mysterious visitor from the heavens and the impregnation a young virgin? That story is commonplace in the reports of women abductees. The phrase “Do not be afraid,” is probably the single most repeated quote that gets attributed to the aliens in all of abduction literature.
In the story, Ann obviously isn’t a virgin, but the implication that she is pregnant by unknown means is central to the plot. Like Mary, her child (also a son) is somehow profoundly different. Few things in the western world are more fraught with uneasy drama than a miraculous pregnancy.
In the nutty community of UFO researchers and experiencers, the question of whether Jesus was a product of direct tampering by aliens is the stuff of endless conjecture. Was the Star of Bethlehem a flying craft checking in on their hybridization program? And in the end, Jesus was “...carried up into heaven.” (Luke 24:50-52) and his apostles were witnesses to his ascension, “as they were looking, he was taken up; and a cloud received him out of their sight." (Acts 1:9) This very much matches the conclusion of the made for TV movie, where the parade of goddesses and their divine newborns are whisked away into the sun with a lap-dissolve and a cloud.
Pop-culture foreshadowing
1974 was a year with another odd predictive show involving UFOs. During my youth I was absolutely fascinated with the nightly show, The CBS Radio Mystery Theater. It was on a local AM radio station each weeknight at 11:07, and I would lie in bed and listen to the drama on my clock radio. There were stories of the paranormal, ghosts and monsters.
There was one strangely predictive episode titled: The Sighting. It’s a fictional re-telling of a series of UFO abductions. The original air-date was November 25, 1974, less than two months after The Stranger Within aired on TV. In this radio drama, there is set of plot points that closely match elements within a typical UFO abduction account; including mind control, repeated abductions, telepathy and implants. Again, this was long before the proliferation in the media of abduction accounts.
The power of creativity
Richard Matheson’s output over the last 62 years has been astounding. The consistency and breadth leaves me dumbfounded. His first short story was published in 1950 and for the next decade he really cranked ‘em out. The short story Trespass (the basis for the movie) emerged during that creative frenzy. Like his other early stories, it was printed in a pulp sci-fi magazine.
I am convinced that there is a very real power in the creative process, and when abandoning (or disciplining) oneself to this kind of artistic inspiration, something mysterious can unfold. The artist can somehow tap into deeper truths. The work-a-day routine of sitting in front of a typewriter (or canvas, or 2-ply Bristol) can be seen as a ritual act, very much like the forgotten alchemist who sits before his candle. Matheson must have been on fire during those early years, and something weirdly predictive seems to have been manifested in this tight little story.
These ideas have been explored magnificently by Jeffery Kripal in his book Mutants and Monsters and by Christopher Knowles on his blog The Secret Sun. Both these authors have examined the strange emergence of mythology in the tawdry pages of super hero comics and low-brow magazines.
A short list of Matheson’s credits and interconnections
The short story Duel (1971) was adapted into the TV movie with the same name in the same year. This movie launched the career of young director Steven Spielberg (no stranger to UFOs). Matheson says that Duel was inspired from a real-life incident where he and his friend, Jerry Sohl, were dangerously tailgated by a large truck on the very same day as the Kennedy assassination. Sohl was another stalwart writer for television, his sci-fi credits include The Twilight Zone, The Outer Limits, The Invaders, Star Trek and The Man From Atlantis.
Both The Night Stalker (1972), and The Night Strangler (1973) were scripted by Matheson. These two television movies were the genesis of the series Kolchak: The Night Stalker (1974). More on this later.
Matheson's science fiction vampire novel, I Am Legend (1954), has had three different film adaptations. The Last Man on Earth (1964 with Vincent Price), The Omega Man (1971 with Charlton Heston), and Am Legend (2007 with Will Smith). None of these movies followed Matheson’s book very closely, and he says that George Romero’s Night of the Living Dead (1968) comes closest. So, our present zombie-craze traces back directly to Matheson.
Matheson's short story Button was filmed as The Box in 2009, a film much heralded by Christopher Knowles at The Secret Sun.
Matheson’s 1978 novel What Dreams May Come was later filmed in 1998. This movie was referenced in the trilogy of channeled books Conversations with God by Neale Donald Walsch. During the back and forth dialog with God (yes, him), Walsch is given information about the afterlife and how heaven and hell actually manifest for the recently departed. Walsch excitedly references the movie What Dreams May Come (staring Robin “Nanu Nanu” Williams), he is shocked at how the movie’s plot perfectly matches the description of the afterlife given by God. So, it seems Matheson’s metaphysical ideas are confirmed by none other than God himself!
More about Walsch. He was the lead actor in the 2003 movie Indigo. He plays the grandfather of a psychic 10-year old girl. The implication is that the girl might be a hybrid alien.
A hardcover collection He Is Legend: An Anthology Celebrating Richard Matheson was released in February 2009. This book is an anthology of 16 original stories inspired by Matheson's works. Contributors include none other than alien abductee Whitley Strieber.
A character named Senator Richard Matheson appeared in several episodes of The X-Files. The series' creator, Chris Carter, was a huge fan of Matheson's work including his scripts for The Twilight Zone and The Night Stalker.
As noted above, Matheson wrote the original screenplay for The Night Stalker where the character of Karl Kolchak was introduced. This 1972 movie was the genesis for the TV series Kolchak: The Night Stalker. The show premiered September 13th 1974.
The Night Stalker and missing time
This series was only around for one season and it plays an important role in my life. It is directly connected to the very reason I am so obsessive about the UFO topic. I was a super nerdy little kid and O how I loved that show. On a Friday night in 1974 (that year again) I was walking home from a high school football game, I left early to make sure to be home in time to see this very show. During the short walk, I saw a jarring orange flash in the sky, and when I got home my parents were angry with me.
Darren McGavin in the role he was born to play.
It’s hard to know exactly, but I can’t account for close to two-hours of time. I remember that I was really upset because I had missed The Night Stalker, if this story of missing time didn’t include my favorite TV show as a kind of anchor, I am quite certain I would have forgotten the whole thing. I knew the show was on for one-hour starting at 10 o’clock, so I was very aware of where I was and what I was doing leading up to the missing time.
Caption below image: Our Sun Goddess heroine in a moment of existential contemplation.
What does it mean?
I dug into The Stranger Within for emotional and personal reasons, there was nothing at all logical in my investigation. Peering into this made-for-TV movie unleashed a flood of synchronistic weirdness. Something palpable emerged and parts of it are aligned with my direct experience. I started this exhaustive essay by saying “bits of that movie have been stuck in my head for the last 38 years.” I was describing a very real itch, and when I started scratching, something elusive showed itself.
Final note: This movie ain’t easy to find. All I can do is suggest you search on-line for a DVD. I got mine used for $11.
An extended version of this article is accessible on Mike Clelland's blog, here.
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Mike Clelland never went to art school, instead he spent his youth reading MAD magazine. He was born in Detroit in 1962, and has spent his life working (mostly) as an illustrator doing (mostly) cartoons.
He spent the ‘80s (as a Yuppie) as a free-lance illustrator in New York City. He eventually settled in rural Idaho to pursue the role of ski bum. He has worked as an outdoor educator and guide, in both summer and winter, in Alaska, Canada, The North Cascades and throughout the Rockies.
His recent research into UFO abduction and synchronicity was literally forced upon him as he tries to make sense of a series of profound coincidences. He runs a blog titled Hidden Experience, where he posts essays, personal experiences and audio interviews.
He has published a handful of books, including Ultralight Backpackin' Tips, a cartoon instructional about camping with a ridiculously light pack.
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